


Elinore

by unorigelnal (jayburding)



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU - Comicverse, Nightwing (Comics)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-04
Updated: 2012-08-04
Packaged: 2017-11-11 10:58:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/477811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jayburding/pseuds/unorigelnal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Don’t underestimate the importance of a toy. (For Fennel the Frog, Nightjar’s treasure and a casualty of mice)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Elinore

The stitches are not pretty, but they are serviceable. The fabric is frail though, and for each tiny stitch he places to mend the tear, the fabric pulls and tears again. Eventually he has to stop, half finished and worse off, or ruin her completely.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and cradles the toy against his chest with reverent hands. The stuffing pushes through the cracks, trickling over his fingers and collecting in his lap.

“Grayson,” Damian calls from downstairs, sharp as ever, “you’re making us late.”

“I’ll be right there, little Wing.” He collects up what he can of the disintegrating toy and wraps her up again, tucking her away in the cupboard.

_I’m sorry._

+

The manor’s a weird place to be in the early morning, that awkward point after patrol finishes but before Alfred wakes up (unless things have gone wrong, in which case Alfred is already up). Tim only means to drop in to use the computers in the Cave, but the static buzz of the television catches his attention as he passes the living room.

He peers around the door. The only light in the room is the flicker-flash of the screen, odd, warping shadows chasing each other over the blue tint of the walls. A ghost of a white face flashes against the dark cushions of the couch.

“Dick?”

Dick gives him a watery smile from amidst the nest of blankets he’s created on the sofa.

“Hey Timmy.”

“Dick, are you... watching Sex and the City?”

“It was on.” He shifts and opens up a space for Tim. Tim begrudgingly joins him, because Dick is trying to pretend he’s crying over Carrie’s latest break up, and Tim knows for a fact he doesn’t cry like that for anything less than P.S. I Love You. Something’s wrong.

“Bad night?” he asks as he tucks himself against Dick’s side, and his brother fusses with the blankets until Tim is sweltering with the weight of warmth.

“Quiet actually,” Dick replies as he sneaks an arm around Tim’s shoulders.

“Then dare I ask why you’re watching Sex and the City at six in the morning, rather than sleeping?” Tim leans into the hug. “I’d hate to have to think Damian is the sane one of the duo.”

“Couldn’t sleep,” Dick murmurs, practically dragging Tim into his lap now Tim’s given him half the chance. “Will you stay for a bit?”

He’s really here to work, but Dick’s grip around his waist is the wrong side of desperate, and his eyes still glint wetly in the flickering light.

“Ok. Just for a bit.”

+

After he extricates himself from his sleeping brother’s blanket nest, Tim gets barely half an hour of peace before he’s interrupted again. Turns out Dick isn’t the only one who can’t sleep this morning.

“Drake, how did you convince Grayson to cease his attempts at fatherhood?”

Tim looks up from his work to find his sometime little brother glaring at him over the desk. The pyjamas and old jumper- is that Dick’s?- do little to soften the image he presents. Damian doesn’t really do soft.

“Dick’s doing what now?” he asks.

“As far as I can tell he is attempting to act like a parent, and is proving woefully inadequate. I have tried to make him desist, but now he is mooning around the house like a kicked puppy, and getting even less done than before.”

Great, so it’s the brat’s fault that Dick looks like someone shot Zitka. Somehow, Tim isn’t surprised.

“Well?” Damian snaps. “What are you going to do about it?”

Tim sighs, and wonders when he became the mother in their bizarre family. “Why don’t you ask Alfred for help? He’s always been better at handling Dick.”

“Pennyworth is being unhelpful.” Damian looks a minute away from stamping his feet in frustration. Tim is almost tempted to wait it out and see if he would, but it isn’t worth the potential attempted homicide that might ensue. Dick will not forgive him if he breaks Robin, even if the little maniac deserves it.

“Fine,” Tim says, knowing he’ll probably regret it. “What did you do?”

Damian looks affronted. Maybe. It’s hard to tell when he spends most of his time looking like that.

“Why do you assume I have done anything?” he asks.

Because it’s you? “Because Dick is a drama queen,” Tim replies, “but he doesn’t do things completely without reason. A kicked puppy requires someone kicked it.”

“I wouldn’t humour his pathetic attempts to act as a suitable parent. Is that it?”

“What pathetic attempts weren’t you humouring this time?”

“Outings. Car rides. Stuffed toys.” Damian looks positively disgusted with the last one. “I believe he got his ideas from those atrocious movies he watches.”

“Ah, yeah, that’ll do it.” If Dick had his way, movie night would only ever be romantic comedies. Or Sex and the City. “Was that all?”

“...Yes.”

Tim doesn’t buy it for a minute. “Try lying to someone who isn’t better than you at it.”

Damian glares at him, but doesn’t deny it. “The stuffed animal may have been a little worse for wear.”

“He got you a bear and you broke it?” Tim sighs. That would have been enough to upset their softie of an older brother, even if it doesn’t sound like enough to drive Dick to tears. There is probably more Damian isn’t telling him. There usually is.

“I did not ask him to provide me with such!” Damian snaps, twisting his hands into his baggy jumper. He’s getting defensive now. “And if it was that fragile in the first place, why was he manhandling it like that?”

“Wait, fragile?”

Oh crap.

“Damian, what animal was it?”

Damian looks at him like he’s nuts. “What are you talking about, Drake? I told you it was a stuffed animal.”

“What animal?”

“I suppose it was meant to be an elephant, thought the construction left something to be desired.”

Crap.

“Brat, you have no idea what you’ve done.”

+

“Grayson.”

Dick stirs and opens his eyes, salt cracking on his eyelashes. “Damian?”

His little brother is barely an arm’s length away, shifting uncomfortably on the spot. There’s an old blanket clutched in his arms.

Elinore’s blanket.

He’s immediately awake and up, scrubbing his eyes clear. “Where did you get that? Let me have it.”

Damian doesn’t give it up, cradling the bundle like a kid holding his infant sibling for the first time: infinitely careful and yet so certain he’s going to drop them at any moment.

“I’m sorry.”

Dick blinks. “What?” He tallies up the number of times Damian’s apologised to him for anything and can count them on one hand. “Why?”

“I didn’t mean to break your toy,” Damian says stiffly, supremely awkward. “I didn’t know it was that important.”

“You shouldn’t have done it regardless,” Tim says from the door. Dick hadn’t even noticed him until then.

“I know that,” Damian snaps, hands clenched into the thick fabric of the blanket. He looks down at the rumpled fabric and gulps. “It was disrespectful of me to break a gift from your parents, particularly when you meant to give it to me.”

He sounds like he’s been coached, but every awkward syllable is more than Dick ever expected to get. Damian means it, as much as he can mean it without really understanding.

Dick smiles, scrubbing his eyes again when they start to burn, and reaches out to his youngest brother.

“Come here.”

Damian looks suspicious. “Why?”

“Just come here, little Wing.” Dick catches him by the shoulder and drags him into a rather reluctant hug. Damian stays frozen in his arms, waiting for a backlash that isn’t coming.

“Thank you for apologising,” Dick struggles to say around the lump in his throat. “I forgive you.”

Elinore’s still broken, but for Damian to apologise to him over something so seemingly infantile... it means a lot.

“Is it possible to fix her?” Damian asks, quiet.

Dick swallows a sob. “I tried, but she’s not staying together anymore. This might be it for her, little Wing. It’s ok, though.”

He’s such a liar. He can feel Tim’s hand on his shoulder, steadying him as his eyes burn and blur. Damian, self conscious though he is, wraps one arm around Dick’s neck and holds on. Ellie in her blanket is still caught between them.

“Don’t cry, Grayson,” Damian grumbles, but only holds on tighter. “Pennyworth can probably fix her.”

“She’ll be fine,” Tim murmurs. Dick pulls him down with his free hand and hugs them both, sobbing all the harder.

He doesn’t let go of his brothers for a while.

+

A couple of weeks later, there’s a present waiting for Dick when he returns from patrol. A little elephant, no bigger than his palm, awkwardly stitched together entirely from patches. Red, green and yellow. Robin colours.

There’s a little tag around its neck.

_“Until Elinore is fixed.”_ No name, but Dick knows.

He cries all over again. It’s very embarrassing.


End file.
